Chapter 179

Scented smoke filled the room and where sunlight through a glass window illuminated various books, chairs and a central table the three men sat at. Otherwise it was pretty dark, as there was only one window and the room was rather large.

Gleetus belched loudly over the laughter of his two friends while giving them a rude gesture, yet he smiled too. “Just because you can’t do it doesn’t mean I can’t do it!”

“She is out of your league my friend!” Another of the young men said with a cackle, smacking the ass of a passing nearby maid. The young woman yelped, angrily scowled at the man, and then hurried out of the lake house with more laughter following her.

Gleetus grumbled to himself and held a glass of wine to his lips, sipping on it out of frustration and thinking back on the new lady of the court he had a crush on. “I just don’t understand why Allie wastes her time with that maimed twat! He’s useless to everybody and the only person she ever talks to is him!”

“I heard even Braden Rooze was shot down. She must be a real looker.” The other of Gleetus’ friends said thoughtfully, smoking on a pipe and blowing out rings of smoke. “Either way, at least you taught Lahn a lesson to stay away from your girl. Don’t worry, she’s from a poor country household and I’m sure your father’s influence will be enough to pressure them into some kind of courtship.”

Adjusting his frilled, buttoned jacket looking out the window onto the shimmering lake nearby, Gleetus only grunted. “Yes you’re probably right. I’ve already told my father about it and he said he’d look into house Wraithtide soon. Perhaps I’ll be able to meet with their head of household sometime to apply pressure this week if lucky.”

“There’s no need for that. We’re already here.”

Gleetus nearly fell out of his chair in surprise and one of the other lordlings screamed just as an aura of extreme malice slammed into them like a sledgehammer. The third man abruptly vomited, puking all over the table.

Gleetus, who cried out as red frost began to accumulate along the surroundings and even along his skin - shoved the chair back and scrambled in a panic to wheel around. But there was no one there. “What the hell!?”

The sound of bone on wood cracked the silence, and Gleetus wheeled around again to see his two companions slump to the floor on either side of a hooded man clad in black, feet up on the table in a relaxed position. He stared out at Gleetus with glowing crimson eyes, face otherwise shadowed in the light of the single window and arms crossed.

They just stared at one another, the unknown intruder very calm while Gleetus felt his heart rapidly pounding in his chest. He didn’t know who this guy was, but his soul roared at him to run - telling him that this man was dangerous. How had he not heard this person enter? Why was Gleetus’s mana not coming to his call? Why was the air so frigidly cold?

There was only one option. Gleetus was the definition of a coward, thus he decided to abandon his friends to their fate. Shakily, Gleetus made his move - bolting for the door only to stagger and fall when crimson ice swept up one leg to hold in him place.

Gleetus flopped forward, hitting the ground and breaking his ankle with a shrill scream when the ice halfway up his foot didn’t budge and the rest of his body kept going under momentum. “HELP! HELP WE HAVE AN INTRUDER! GUARDS! GUARDS COME NOW!!!”

“Your guards have been… incapacitated.” Riven said, not having moved from his spot on the chair between the two crumpled men on either side of him. “Let me introduce myself… I am Allie Wraithtide’s brother. My name is Riven Wraithtide, also known as Riven Thane.”

Gleetus, who’d been bawling and wailing on the ground while intermittently calling out to the soldiers his family hired as personal security - froze upon hearing Riven’s words. His eyes went wide, and his breathing picked up between tearful coughs of pain. “Wait… What?”

The shock was apparent, but Riven didn’t say it again. Instead, Riven slowly lifted a finger - and abruptly a spike of crimson ice shot up from the floor and punctured Gleetus in the left thigh.

Again, Gleetus screamed.

“Allie sent me to collect you.” Riven stated, only whispering but infusing his voice with mana to amplify the sound over the wails of the bleeding man on the floor. “For what you did to Lahn.”

Again, Riven lifted a finger and another spike lanced out from the frost-covered floor to skewers Gleetus in the right shoulder.

“I DON’T KNOW WHAT YOU’RE TALKING ABOUT!” Gleetus yelled between choked sobs. “WHAT IN THE HELLS IS WRONG WITH YOU! WHO ARE YOU REALLY!?”

Another finger lifted, skewering him this time in the left hand.

Gleetus flailed, writhing about and trying to rip his body off of the magics while his heart beat like a cherokee drum in a panic.

“No… No that will not do.” Riven said, getting ready to lift another finger. “Admit what you did, and tell me why - so that I can upload this recording to the Dawn forums. We were going to get Lahn to do it, but we found out that he’d already tried. Apparently subterfuge is still somewhat protected unless certain circumstances are met, that clause covers your little stunt in the barracks the other day. So I’m going to continue torturing you until you tell me in vivid detail what it was you did that day - and why.”

Another finger lifted, another crimson spike skewered Gleetus’s arm.

“I’M INNOCENT!!! I WASN’T THE ONE TO-”

Another spike skewered his pelvis.

Gleetus screamed. “FINE! FINE IT WAS ME!!! I BEAT THE SHIT OUT OF HIM WITH A FIRE IRON! BUT I WAS ONLY TEACHING THAT LITTLE CRIPPLED BITCH THAT STALKING YOUR SISTER WAS-”

Another spike skewered his good ankle, causing Gleetus to break down into violent sobs. Blood was everywhere, and he’d pissed himself halfway through the exchange. He couldn't even move properly anymore with the amount of spikes sticking through his extremities.

“He wasn’t stalking my sister at all.” Riven said flatly, kicking his legs off the table and leaning forward with a chuckle. “If anything, my sister was stalking him. She had a crush, you see, and it even appears you and those twat siblings of his stole the invitation to the royal ball that she’d given him - after you beat him half to death. I’m convinced, by the looks of him, you actually meant to murder him right then and there. It was only luck his maid came in time to get some help. He would have died if she hadn’t - which brings us to now… You tried to kill Allie Thane’s friend. That was a very big mistake. So tell me the real reason why you did it? Not some made up hocus pocus about stalking - because we both know that’s a lie.”

“M-My family w-will-”

“Your family will do nothing, unless they want to join you in hell after you’re dead.” Riven said, cutting him off with narrowed eyes. “You pathetic little meatbag.”

Riven started channeling energy through his unholy pillar, and the next words he used were infused with the ability of ‘Silvertongue’. His voice reverberated unnaturally, and Gleetus seemed to shrink back when Riven spoke. “Give me the real reason you decided to try and kill Lahn.”

[Silvertongue (Unholy): Soak your words with unholy mana to briefly capture the minds of lesser beings, allowing only those with a less Willpower than you to be affected and enabling you to persuade them more easily. This spell scales with both Willpower and Negative Charisma, as well as the amount of mana you put into it. This spell may be developed into a better version of itself by acquiring the 'Depravity' subpillar. Extremely high mana cost, low cooldown.]

Gleetus’s eyes glazed over, his words became drawled as if he was drunk, and his body became relaxed despite the numerous red spikes skewering his limbs. “I did not mean to kill him, I only meant to beat him badly - but I got carried away when he started crying. It was just too easy, he was such an easy mark to pick on. It made me look better in front of the other nobility, and it was fun - especially when his sister urged me to go on during the beating. Lahn spoke back to me in class not long ago when your sister was there, he was the reason why your sister ignored me. So I took care of him to get the attention of your sister - and even if it was bad attention, I’d have used the threat of potentially ending him next time to manipulate her to sleep with me. My father is a powerful man, and he could have shielded me from a small noble house such as yours. At least I had thought so until now, I did not realize who she really was if what you say is true.”

Riven let the spell drop, and the distant far-off look on Gleetus’s face vanished - only to be replaced with the pained horror of what was happening when he began to scream again.

Another finger rose, another spike punctured the floored victim, and Riven sneered when Gleetus began to beg.

***

Fay continued to draw out the ritual circle, once in a while taking time to evaluate the sigils, runes and diagrams in the books her mother had given her before going back to the chalk she was scribbling with on the bedroom floor. Occasionally she’d take an item from a pouch at her side, such as an odd marble, a roden’s skull, and some of Lahn’s hair - circling them with different diagram outlines before continuing on with the rest.

She was trying not to smile at the two on the bed. They were fucking adorable, and Lahn’s reception of who she was had gone over very well. He’d been obviously surprised, but otherwise hadn’t changed his opinion of Allie in the slightest.

Allie lay there next to him, still armored up, eyes locked and holding hands while whispering to him. Occasionally laughing at whatever he was saying in reply, the two had fallen into their own little world even despite Fay’s presence or Lahn’s mother - Shovi - who’d taken up residence in a chair in the corner of the room after guaranteeing the maids of the household that everything was alright.

Shovi didn’t know what to make of this situation, and it was obvious. On one hand Shovi was incredibly happy for her son, not only because he’d found a friend and a potential lover - which were both long shots for him prior to now given the social circles he was introduced to alongside his condition - but this was very dangerous waters he was treading. Not only for himself, but for the family. Shovi had often heard rumors of Queen Allie Thane, Butcher of Carnis, the she-devil that struck fear into the hearts of Dawn’s enemies while striking awe into the most veteran soldiers of the king’s men on the battlefield. Up until now neither Allie nor Riven had any footage that Shovi had seen displaying their faces - perhaps there was some obscure video somewhere, but even after going back through the forums it hadn’t been found. How was Shovi supposed to know these two abnormally pale siblings were the Thane siblings?

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

With a snap of their fingers either one of them could spell disaster for the Kingdom of Dawn. Allie wasn’t as powerful as Riven but she was still a walking disaster, and she was the primary figurehead of their allied, primarily-undead kingdom to the north. While her brother was just a gods-damned monster who had literally wiped out an entire city with hundreds of thousands of people if not more than that over the course of a few minutes when he’d become enraged.

Yet here Allie was… snuggling up to Shovi’s crippled son on the bed and giggling at his stupid jokes while occasionally giving him giddy pecks as kisses. Meanwhile Riven’s demon - THE Riven Thane’s demon - was creating a ritualistic cure of sorts for her boy. What would her husband say after learning of this? What would he do? Would he finally acknowledge Lahn if things changed for the better? Daring to look up and watch Allie crinkle her nose with another high-pitched laugh at Lahn’s whispers, Shovi blushed with pride and unbridled glee - but quickly averted her gaze uncertainly and abruptly when Allie looked her way.

“Do you wish to pull up a chair, Lady Shovi Lucio?” Allie asked with a bright smile as she propped her head up on one elbow. “Come tell me about what your husband and eldest son are likely up to. I know they left for the palace due to the announcement of foreign invaders, but I know little of what internal politics and military mindsets are here in the capital. It was one of the reasons why I even accepted the king’s invitation to come - I wish to be acquainted with your people to get a better idea of who you all are.”

Shovi’s eyebrows lifted in surprise, and she abruptly stood up to curtsy in respect before pulling the chair she was sitting in behind her and walking over to the edge of the bed - being careful not to step on any of Fay’s chalk drawings. Sitting down with an elegant flare of her green dress, she parked herself nearby and spared an excited wink to her blushing son. “Well I can’t tell you too much because I simply don’t know. My husband, Lord NIkola Lucio has always been rather tight-lipped about the happenings of the capital. Though I’m sure if you wanted to know more, other ladies of the court could fill you in at our regular gatherings. Other husbands are more liberal in what they say - so they potentially have some insight that I would not.”

Allie began to grin - displaying her small fangs just barely, and Lahn visibly rolled his eyes. “I see. Are you inviting me to one of these… gatherings, then?”

“Precisely so! It isn’t anything important, just tea time and gossip with some good food.” Shovi beamed, clapping once with a delighted nod. “Oh I’m so very excited to actually get to meet and speak with you! It’s truly an honor, your majesty!

“Oh please! Call me Allie. And certainly, I’d love to come. When’s the next one?”

Lahn huffed. “Don’t let her wrangle you into those boring tea parties, they’re dreadful. I’ve had to sit through them myself and I nearly want to roll my chair off the deck to end it all whenever my attendance is required!”

“LAHN!” Shovi exclaimed to the laughter of her son and Allie both, putting her hands on her cheeks in mock anger. “How could you say something like that!? All my friends just LOVE being around you!”

“They treat me like a broken puppy dog.” Lahn stated with a knowing look. “But yes, at least they’re nice to me. Could certainly be worse.”

“Indeed it could. And don’t you ruin this opportunity for me to show off your new lady friend to my posse! That’s just rude!” Shovi paused mid sentence and hesitated, then lifted a finger of inquiry. “May I ask… Would it be too forward to assume that you and my son are courting?”

“MOTHER!” Lahn exclaimed, only to get more laughter from Allie while she blushed.

“That’d only be correct if Lahn wants it to be so.” Allie replied warmly, having dismissed her gauntlets to wrap her slender fingers around Lahn’s own again - not withdrawing in disgust at all like so many others had before her when his withered flesh touched her own. “I personally was aiming for that, but I don’t know if I’m good enough for him.”

“Allie, shut up.” Lahn stated flatly - getting a wide eyed glare from his mother.

But the reaction Allie had showed Shovi just how close the two had become in such a short time. It’d only been a few months that Lahn had been enrolled in school, and things had been a roller coaster since then - but they’d turned out brilliantly here at the end.

Shovi cleared her throat, and her nerves calmed as she realized that not only did Allie not take offense, she even enjoyed the banter and the fact that he’d teasingly told her to shut it. Perhaps telling her son to be extremely respectful would be a bad idea, but it’d been the first knee-jerk thought Shovi had when finding Allie’s true identity out. No, she’d not interfere in any major way and just let it take its road. He obviously was doing something right by the way Allie looked at him. “So how did you and Lahn meet, if you don’t mind me asking?”

Allie opened her mouth to reply - but a black portal appeared and a flash of black propelled both Riven and Gleetus into Lahn’s room. Riven was hauling Gleetus by the collar, yet the limp, whimpering man that Riven tossed to the ground with a splat of blood was far from what Allie remembered Gleetus to be.

The young lordling bully was broken, far worse than what Gleetus had even done to Lahn. His legs and arms were snapped backwards in multiple places at awkward angles, and he looked like a bloody pincushion with dozens of spikes sticking out of him. The blood that did seep out of his body was being rerouted back into his vessels as Riven manipulated it to do so - keeping him alive, and he smiled widely at his sister with a thumbs up when he appeared.

“I just learned my first healing spell! Er... Perhaps healing isn't the right word for it. Maintenance of life spell, perhaps?” Riven said with a laugh. “It’s pretty decent actually. If people can’t go into shock because of blood loss, they don’t die. Simple, but effective. I’ve essentially kept this asswipe alive for the past hour by mapping out his blood vessels to replicate them, whereas any normal person would bleed out in minutes.”

Pulling up a screen and ignoring the horrified, shocked looks of Shovi and Lahn, Riven showed Allie the new spell. Though he did note that the shock and horror was quickly replaced by rage in Shovi, whereas Lahn was overcome with an emotion Riven couldn’t quite place when looking down at the man who’d tormented him for years.

[Voodoo Doll (Blood)(Tier 2): Scan your target to map out their vessels and infuse your mana into their bloodstream. You then gain the ability to replicate their bloodstream regardless of whether or not they have extensive wounds - enabling you to keep them alive as long as their brain remains intact. You may also use this ability on hostiles to form painful blood clots. Heart attacks caused by this ability do critical strike damage. Dependent on both Intelligence(90%) and Willpower (10%) stats. Medium cooldown. This is a channeling ability and will not work if interrupted by using other spells.]

Allie’s eyes widened and she shifted off the bed, putting her boots on the floor and exclaiming her excitement with a laugh - hands on her head. “Riven! That’s so good! Can you show me?”

“I’m showing you right now.” Riven stated, confused. "I can cancel it and reshow you if you'd like to see the hand gestures, if that's what you're getting at. I've done it a couple times already when casting portals to jump across this capital city. Uhm... Mandon is the name of this city - right?"

“No! I mean yes - it is called Mandon, but no! I meant the blood clots!” Allie stood up and walked over to the sniveling man who was coughing blood intermittently on the floor and shaking violently. “Give him a heart attack and watch him squirm a bit before saving him again! You can do that right?”

Riven thought about it a moment, scratching his chin, then underwent the proper motions for his new tier 2 spell. He flared his fingers - spreading them apart before pointing his open palm in Gleetus’s direction in a grasping motion to test it out.

Immediately Gleetus began to gasp, turning white and spasming on the ground even more violently than he’d been choking up blood. Allie began to laugh and clap her hands, violently kicking Gleetus in the rib cage to the sound of snapping bones that sent the lordling slamming into a far wall - still spasming.

Riven shifted his hand slightly, and Gleetus gasped for air - beginning to violently sob. “He’s like a little porcupine! Isn’t he cute!?”

“Allie… Can you please stop?”

Both vampires turned curiously back to where Lahn was trying to sit up on the bed. He was giving it quite the effort, and his mother next to him had turned pale.

“Our house is going to be in a lot of trouble if you murder him…” Lahn said hesitantly, glancing over to his mother where she was beginning to have a nervous breakdown by the way her mouth and eyebrow twitched while scraping her nails against her thighs. “Please don’t kill him. Gleetus has a very powerful father who-”

“We’ll kill his father.” Allie said with an upbeat, chipper tone, bending down to pull gleetus up by the hair and bringing his wide, bloodshot eyes to meet her own as he dangled limply under her strength. She gave Gleetus a wide, fanged smile. “That’ll be after we kill Gleetus first though! When we change you into a vampire Lahn, your first meal will be this guy!”

Allie roughly shook the man, sending droplets of blood everywhere like a dog would shake off water - but they quickly retracted and sank back into the streams of blood across Gleetus’s ruined, torn body - flowing outside of his severed vessels in many places due to Riven’s magic.

That’s when Gleetus began to beg. “P-Please Allie! I didn’t know-”

Her other fist slammed into his gut, causing Gleetus to lose the air in his lungs before her hand ripped out part of his lower intestine. She flung the organ to the floor, sneering at the man in her grasp. “You don’t get to talk! No, no, no… You’re just-”

“Allie!” Lahn called out, timid but also fearful. “Allie you’re scaring me! Please stop!”

For the first time since Riven had met Allie after the integration started, Riven saw doubt and uncertainty in her eyes. She glanced over to where Lahn’s chest was heaving despite broken ribs, and her eyes softened.

“Allie…” Lahn said warily, grimacing due to speaking too fast after Gleetus had broken his jaw. His eyes fell to the sobbing face of Gleetus when Allie flung him across the room with another splat, before Lahn took in a deep breath. “Allie, for me… please don’t kill him.”

“But…” Allie said, frowning. She took a couple steps towards the bed, past Lahn’s mom who was pale and staring at the entrails that’d been ripped out of the young lordling, and sat beside her crippled friend. “Why? He hurt you, severely. He tried to kill you Lahn. I’d thought you would want this… and you’ll need to feed if you become a vampire. When the change occurs, you become crazed because you start out starved! When I turn you-”

“Allie!” Lahn said, exasperated - trying to hold up a hand but grimacing as he did so. “Allie, you’re amazing and I appreciate that you’re trying to protect me - but this isn’t what I want. I don’t want to… to feed on him. You never even asked me Allie - you just assumed. But I don’t want to become a vampire.”

He gave her a sheepish smile, and Allie’s face froze in shock.

“You see!” Gleetus gasped with a horrified, blood-flecked rattle to his voice. He was frantic, despite all his injuries, and he grasped onto Lahn’s words despite the shock of what was going on in this situation and all the things he’d learned in the past hour. “He doesn’t want me dead! You don’t need to do this! Spare me!”

“Shut the fuck up.” Riven, who was standing nearby, kicked him with a blur of motion so fast that neither Lahn nor Shovi could follow the motion. In turn, Gleetus’s head was literally snapped off his body - hitting the ceiling and bouncing down onto the floor.

Shovi screamed.

Lahn went pale.

Fay giggled.

Allie sighed. “Riven! He just said that he didn’t want us to kill him!”

“Oh he’s not dead.” Riven casually gestured to the head where blood was still streaming into the arteries of the decapitated neck. “I haven’t stopped channeling yet. This voodoo doll magic is really neat! I figured that’d work, just wanted to see for myself - but his brain cells aren't dying because I'm still supplying them with blood.”

Indeed, Gleetus’s shocked face with a smashed-in nose and unhinged jaw was blinking rapidly - eyes darting around to let out a silent scream. But he didn’t have lungs, and although the blood streams were drawing his head back towards the rest of his body - he wasn’t able to utilize anything below the neck where Riven had kicked his head off.

Allie gawked for a moment, shook herself out of her stupor, then turned back to Lahn. Clasping his withered hand in her own - she returned his sheepish smile with one of her own. “I… guess I got ahead of myself. I’d just assumed you’d want to become like me… it’d make you a lot stronger, and we’d be able to fit together better because of it.”

“I don’t need to be a vampire to fit together with you, as long as you’ll have me as a human.” Lahn replied, having let himself drift back into a thick pillow underneath his head. Sighing, he closed his eyes. “That’s just a very, very big decision to make. Maybe I’ll change my mind one day, just… just don’t throw it on me so fast. Is that ok?”

“That’s absolutely ok!” Allie said in turn, smiling gently down at the young man she’d fallen for. “I’m so sorry, I was being stupid. And I also kind of wondered how you’d react… so we have a backup plan to feeding Gleetus to you. Fay, how’s the ritual coming along?”

Fay glared up at Riven, pooching her lips and humphing to point to where some of Gleetus had smeared the chalk diagrams. “It’d be done if Riven hadn’t bounced Gleetus’s head onto the drawings. I’ll have to redraw it, it’ll take another two minutes tops.”

“Good!” Allie replied, rubbing her hands together wickedly to glare daggers at the ruined man on the floor. “Time for plan B!”

“Which is?” Riven asked curiously.

“Well we’re going to take Lahn’s worm and shove it up Gleetus’s ass of course! What else is there if Lahn isn’t going to eat him!?”